After the recent case of the Turkish POWS being burned alive, which followed on the heels of several such acts perpetrated by ISIS, I was wondering what it was about these guys and burning folks to death.
Yesterday I was reading Fire and Sword in the Sudan by Rudolf Slatin and came across the following line:
In 1770 they wrested the province of Kordofan from the Darfur kings, but five years later it was retaken by the latter, and remained under their control until conquered in 1822 by Mohammed Bey Dafterdar, the brother-in-law of Ismail Pasha, who, it will be remembered, was burnt alive at Shendi[
And while Sudan is not a neighbour to Syria, that got me thinking that this jolly little tradition seems to goes back a ways in that general area. 15 minutes of rudimentary research (wiki, frontpagemag.com) later:
The Koran says about Hypocrites: Allah has cursed them and prepared the fires of Hell for them (e.g., 4:145, 9:68, 9:73, and 48:6); and Allah commanded Muhammad to “strive hard against” and “be harsh” to the Hypocrites (9:73).
In December 627 Muhammad led an attack against the Al-Mustalaq tribe. Because that tribe fought back, Muhammad ordered their fortifications to be set on fire, even though the Muslims knew there were women and children inside.
John Braithwaite, staying in Morocco in the late 1720s, says that apostates from Islam would be burnt alive:
THOSE that can be proved after Circumcision to have revolted, are stripped quite naked, then anointed with Tallow, and with a Chain about the Body, brought to the Place of Execution, where they are burnt. Similarly, he notes that non-Muslims entering mosques or being blasphemous against Islam will be burnt, unless they convert to Islam.
I'm sure there's more literature on it, but to me the the bottomline - call it context or insight into the psyche of your garden variety ISIS thug - is that burning someone alive is the historically and theologically approved way of displaying great and terminal contempt for the non-believer, especially when done to someone who's on the surface your co-religionist. You're not just killing them brutally, you're calling them apostates or kaffir while you're doing it.
In short, when you see the next burning video (or preferably don't) you're watching an agency of God (ISIS) following the unshakeable dictates of tradition, culture and religion onlee.
